


The Library

by winterpillowtalk



Series: One Direction vs. Boring Jobs [2]
Category: One Direction (Band), Zayn Malik (Musician)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Library, Alternate Universe - No One Direction, Humor, M/M, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-14
Updated: 2016-04-14
Packaged: 2018-06-02 05:41:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6553207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winterpillowtalk/pseuds/winterpillowtalk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry liked to be organised, Niall did not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Library

“H, I, J, K,” Harry whispered to himself, walking past the bookshelf. He ran his finger across the spine of a few as he went, appreciating the work he had done. It had taken him the best part of four hours, but he had finally put the Non-Fiction books in alphabetical order. Harry loved to be organised, there was something about seeing everything in its place that made him smile. He knew it was painfully sad for a twenty-something year old to be so pleased by such a menial thing, but Harry had accepted that he wasn’t the life and soul of the party years before applying to for a job in his local library.

When he was eighteen, ready to be thrown into the real world, all his classmates were talking about the courses they had chosen to study in university. This is when he suddenly realised how smart his friends were. About seventy percent of them wanted to go into the medical sector and the other thirty percent wanted to go into teaching – both noble professions, all needing a huge amount of time and commitment.

He, however, had found a different calling in life.

Being a librarian.

It was a weird profession, and not many people expected a teenage boy to be applying to study Library Science in City University London. His parents judged him, telling him that he could find a better course, one that opened more exciting opportunities for him. However, Harry couldn’t think of anything more thrilling than stacking books all day, every day until he died from blood loss after a serious paper cut.

“L, M, N, O-“

“R, A, Q, C, W,” Niall’s voice broke through Harry’s concentration, instantly making him lose his place. He groaned to himself, not wanting to express his anger in the library. Taking a deep breath, he turned to face Niall.

“Why?” Harry asked simply, giving the back of Niall’s head an irritated look. He was stood beside the books he’d just spent a good hour sorting out, pulling random ones out and putting them in different places. Harry’s blood boiled. He stormed over to his work colleague, tapping on his back. “What are you doing?”

“Organising,” Niall replied, not looking at Harry as he messed up his work. Harry wasn’t sure why they employed Niall; he was one of the worst librarians the world had ever seen. They must have been short-staffed at one point, because he was certain Zayn wouldn’t give anyone like the person before him a job without a serious need for someone.

All Harry could do was watch as Niall took out another book –  _How to Make Pillows Talk_  – from the shelf, and put it back down in an entirely different section. It felt like someone was stabbing Harry in the back, multiple times, with a blunt knife with every book Niall removed.

Harry stumbled over his words as he tried to put a coherent sentence together. Niall had now made it to the E section, happily putting the books back to front, upside-down and at every possible angle imaginable. Maybe he could push Niall over, causing him to hit his head on the wooden shelf, leaving him to die on the floor. Or, failing that, he could just snap a book shut on his fingers, breaking every single one.

He didn’t always count himself as a violent person, but sometimes people managed to use up his last ounce of patience.

And by ‘people’ he meant Niall. It was always Niall. _Always_.

“Organising?” Harry asked, after taking a couple of calming breaths. “It was organised, all you’re doing is making it a mess.”

Niall turned around quickly – so quickly that Harry was surprised he didn’t snap his neck or give himself whiplash in the process. “Height order,” Niall said, shrugging his shoulders momentarily before going back to his task.

“But that’s so _illogical_ ,” Harry argued, walking to Niall’s side. “No one will be able to find anything that way.”

“But it looks tidier,” Niall said, still not meeting Harry’s eye.

Niall had never been an organised person, not even when they first met. He’d always been the person to throw clothes in the corner of the room, not put his shoes were they belonged and downright refused to do the washing up – even if it was his pans. Harry had no idea where this new love for precision had come from. It was concerning. The only explanation Harry had was that his co-worker had been abducted by aliens, as impossible as that was.

The door swung open, letting a cold draft of air into the room. Harry shivered, looking behind him to see who had entered. The library was pretty quiet that day, so anyone there was an advantage. He didn’t recognise the man that had walked in, meaning he wasn’t one of the regular elderly people who regularly sat the computers, aimlessly staring at the screen as they clicked on random links.

As Harry was thinking about the old people, he managed to lose sight of the person who had just entered. Maybe he’d track the man and question him about Niall’s problematic book stacking method; a third opinion was always a good thing to have.

“- and that’s why it looks like a hill,” Niall finished, finally turning to face Harry, a proud smile on his face. Harry sighed; he wished Niall didn’t think he was winning any argument they had. Harry was right every time, everybody knew that.

He glanced at the books that were in their new order, and he couldn’t lie, it did look like an impressive hill, but it wasn’t how Harry liked it. He had been there for longer than the other man; he had gone to university to get a degree for it, for Christ’s sake. Who else went and paid nine thousand pounds for a qualification in librarian-ing? No one except Harry. He was too dedicated, and he deserved better than being forced to spend his time with Niall.

He needed to do something about it.

Maybe he could get Niall fired... or killed. Did he know an assassin? No. But he once stepped on an ant, which was close enough. Niall was like an ant, but only slightly bigger and with fewer legs.

Harry needed cleats.

***

“I am not raising your pay so you can get cleats,” Zayn said. He was sat behind his desk in the back office, semi-buried under papers. “You hate sports, why do you want them?” Zayn pushed some of the sheets onto the floor, even the important looking ones. Harry wanted to protest, saying that his lack of organisation was driving him insane, but starting a fight with his boss when he was asking for a raise wasn’t a good idea.

Harry gave Zayn his best smile. “I love sports.”

“Like what?” Zayn asked, raising an eyebrow.

Harry hesitated. He didn’t know any sports. What did they do in the Olympics? Origami? Did that need cleats?

“You know... that one you do... on land?” Harry managed to say. Zayn didn’t appear to be convinced. “Swimming?”

“You don’t swim on land, and you don’t need shoes for that.”

Zayn was smart, Harry thought to himself. Would he kill Niall for him? He was sure he could bribe his boss in some way.

Harry stood in front of the desk, waiting for Zayn to give him a small pay rise of three hundred pounds.

“Stop being stupid and get back to your job,” Zayn said, his tone suggesting that he was going to talk about his further. Harry sighed, turning to walk out of the room. He couldn’t believe his amazing persuasion skills did nothing for him, he thought he was pretty good at it. Well, that’s what Liam had told him once.

As Harry left the office, he felt his heart stop. There were books all over the floor, the tables and some had even made their way on top of the bookshelves. In short, books were everywhere by the places they were meant to be – and the order was _still_ a mess.

Harry was going to kill Niall in cold blood... once he managed to track down some cheap shoes. When he had those, he would do it. And not feel sorry at all. He’d probably have to find a lawyer, but they were easy to find these days, he was certain he’d get one person to defend him. Besides, maybe the judge would be kind, understanding his situation. Anyone who liked the keep things tidy would sympathise.

Without another thought, Harry aggressively skipped to the place he expected his work colleague to be. However, once he reached the worst part of the mess, Niall wasn’t there. Instead, where Harry thought he’d see the annoying blond man, he saw someone with brown hair. As he approached, he realised that the man was the person who’d entered the library previously.

“Hello,” Harry whispered, putting on his best Calm Librarian expression. When he didn’t get a response, Harry tried again. “Hello?” This time, he put his hand on the man’s shoulder, making him jump.

The man was wearing a red shirt, with some weird colourful splodge on the front. Harry looked at it for a second, trying to decipher what it was. It looked a little like an elephant that had horrible done plastic surgery. Suddenly, Harry realised he was staring at the stranger. A little awkward. Luckily, the man hadn’t noticed, he was too busy gawking at the bookcase in front of them.

Maybe the man was focused on the chaos. Harry started to feel self-conscious about the mess he didn’t make. He needed to clean it up; it would give the library a bad name if he didn’t. As he took a step forward, the man grabbed his shirt, stopping him in his tracks. Harry’s mind started to race. Why was the man preventing him from walking? Was this the end? He didn’t think his cause of his death was a murder in a library – a small library, too.

Harry decided to stick up for himself. If he was going to die today, it wasn’t going to be without a fight. He went on his tip-toes, making himself seem bigger than he was. David Attenborough once said this worked for bears, so it was worth a shot. “What-?“ Harry said, but was cut off when the stranger started to talk.

“The librarian who was here,” the stranger said in a hushed voice, his hand still firmly holding the material of Harry’s shirt. “He threw all the books on the floor-“

“ _Great_!” Harry said, exasperatedly. “I’ll clean them up now. Sorry about that.” He tried to discreetly get the man to let go of him, fearing for the wellbeing of his clothes. He didn’t want his top to be destroyed, it was his favourite one. He was sure that the man wouldn’t appreciate it if he started to rip off the letters on the back of his shirt.

The man shook his head, craning his neck to face Harry. He looked horrified – wide eyes, pale cheeks, everything. “No,” he whispered, glancing around the space. “He threw them on the floor and then... went.”

“Went home?” Harry groaned, feeling even more anger grow inside him. He probably needed something more heavy-duty than cleats after this.

The stranger shrugged, still not looking comfortable. “He said ‘I gotta Zayn’, and then went _through_ the shelf – right through it, like some kind of portal to Hell!”

Still in the vice-like grip of the man, Harry started to wonder what was happening. Niall opening a portal to another world? It wasn’t possible; the man could hardly open jars. Maybe the man beside him was high, or delusional.

“Listen,” the man said, using his other hand to grip onto Harry’s top, pulling him closer to they were face-to-face. This was so eventful for a library – or for Harry. Nothing like this had ever happened before, and he was scared, yet intrigued. “The man said ‘I gotta Zayn’ went through the solid wood bookcase, and you’re not doing anything? Nothing at all? Who was that man? An alien? A ghost? Nigel Farage?”

“Oh, Christ,” Harry muttered.

“See!” the man said, too loudly for the library, increasing his hold on the fabric of Harry’s shirt.

“I can’t believe you said Nigel Farage in this library when we’re all Number One Corbyn Fans! Zayn and I even have a club dedicated to his left eyebrow.”

The man was silent, loosening his grip on Harry’s clothes. He looked like he was about to laugh, but managed to stop himself. “His left eyebrow? What’s so special about it?”

“Have you seen his left eyebrow before?” Harry asked.

“No.”

“You haven’t _lived_.”

The man groaned and shook Harry violently. “You’re missing the point! He disappeared!”

The amount of shouting made Zayn leave his office. He walked around one of the shelves and stopped dead in his tracks. All he saw was one of his employees being assaulted surrounded by books, not Harry killing Niall like he’d expected when he heard someone yell.

Cautiously, Zayn walked towards Harry and the Mystery Man. He could pick up some of the hushed whispers, but none of it made sense. He swore he heard something about Niall going into Hell, but that was ridiculous, everyone knew Niall went set for Purgatory.

“Hey, what’s up?” Zayn asked in a low voice. The man instantly let go of Harry, making him slump to the ground.

“Niall’s opened a portal,” Harry said, still sat on the floor. He didn’t want to move, it was surprisingly comfortable.

Zayn gave him a confused look, but then it dawned on him. “He found out how to get to Mars again?”

“ _Again_?!” Harry shouted, gaining him a couple of annoyed hushing sounds. He jumped up from the ground to stand by Zayn. He didn’t know Niall had come from Mars. Harry started to wonder what convinced him to come down to Earth. All he could think of was the newly opened cheese engraving shop down the street – it was the best thing in the area.

Zayn nodded, smiling. He gestured towards the semi-circle of padded chairs, making his way towards them when he saw sure the others understood. They followed obediently, giving each other confused glances. Zayn took the seat at the far end, making it easier for him to see Harry and the stranger.

He cleared his throat and linked his fingers together. “It all happened when Niall wore two left boots...”

**Author's Note:**

> Comments? x
> 
>  
> 
> ~~Unnamed man was Louis.~~


End file.
